


Digits

by Scientia_Fantasia



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-07
Updated: 2013-05-07
Packaged: 2017-12-10 15:47:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/787746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scientia_Fantasia/pseuds/Scientia_Fantasia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire fucks everything up and then it turns out better than expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Digits

A few people messed with their supplies absently, rustling paper, rearranging charcoal sticks, some idle conversation about the edges of the group.

Their professor was absent, which wasn’t anything particularly surprising. It was just life-drawing , which they’d been doing all year—what was there to teach? The problem was that the model was gone, too. Ten minutes into art class, and nothing to art over.

Grantaire scribbled absently in the corner of his sketchbook while Feuilly grumbled next to him, leaning back in his chair.

“I could be clocking in hours right now,” he said.

“So leave,” Grantaire suggested. “What’s keeping you here?”

“Well, I’m paying for this class, for one.”

Grantaire shrugged, conceding the point, and that’s about when the door opened. He glanced up to see…

“Holy shit. What’s he doing here?” Grantaire stage-whispered to Feuilly, ducking behind his sketchpad (like some sort of teenager, Christ…).

It was the guy—the god--Grantaire had seen around campus more and more often recently, his flawless head of blonde curls easily identifiable in any crowd, his voice ringing clear whenever he was in a debate with his friends in the halls (or indeed the rest of the student body, sometimes in very large groups), which seemed to be fairly often. The owner of the flawlessly formed muscles Grantaire couldn’t help but notice every time he walked past the track field, which he somehow ended up near quite often despite it being ten minutes out of the way from any normal classes he had.

In short, in walked the recipient of the most ridiculous, heart-stopping, soul-crushing…crush Grantaire had since he was in middle school.

“Oh, him?” Feuilly responded as if they weren’t in the presence of a certified God Among Men.

“Sorry I’m late,” said the god, pulling a rubber band out of his hair and letting it fall over his shoulders. Obscenely.

Grantaire hardly had time to wonder what he meant—late for what, he wasn’t in this class, was he?-- before he stripped, stepped onto the slightly raised stage in the middle of the students, picked up a giant red flag that had been laying there, and took a dignified pose.

The sound of charcoal scratching across papers slowly filled the room, all except for Grantaire’s, left abandoned for a moment on his easel.

He felt like he was going to vomit.

Or at least make a massive fool of himself, which seemed like more and more of a distinct possibility as the heat rose to his face…and pooled in his stomach.

He cursed internally, crossing his legs awkwardly and glaring as a girl next to him snickered at his discomfort.

“Really, Grantaire?” Feuilly teased, laughing under his breath.

“Shut the fuck up,” he grumbled, and forced himself to put charcoal to paper, focusing on the lines in front of him instead of the figure as a whole.

It was a little harder than usual, as well as more difficult, and the next few hours passed in relative agony.

Though in all fairness, he managed to get a hold of himself eventually, the artist in him kicking in and managing to ignore everything around him in favor of the drawing, except maybe a few times when reality crept up to surprise him quite rudely.

He was hopelessly gone, really.

…

Was it tacky to ask your life model for his number afterwards?

\---

The class went as normal, and after a few people started packing up, the model called it quits as well, getting up and retrieving his clothing (to Grantaire’s simultaneous relief and disappointment), and the room slowly filtered out—except that the model hung around, poking around the art supplies and just generally being way too attractive to exist.

Grantaire stubbornly continued to add detail to his drawing for an excuse to hang around, and Feuilly stayed, presumably waiting for Grantaire—though he’d never done that before, so Grantaire was somewhat confused. Or would have been, if he were paying attention at all.

“Keeping fit, huh, Enjolras?” the redhead said after the room was nearly empty. Grantaire glanced at him, then at the model, now looking at them—and then, slightly panicked, back at Feuilly.

“You know him?” Grantaire mouthed. Feuilly shrugged, and the model—Enjolras, apparently—walked over.

“You’re improving,” he commented, looking at Feuilly’s sketch completely unabashedly.

“Yeah, I guess,” said Feuilly, shrugging. “You should see Grantaire’s, though, he’s the best artist in the class.”

He gestured at the other student’s drawing, and Grantaire flushed when Enjolras stepped over to look at his work.

“Oh,” went the blond, eyebrows raised. “You might be right!”

“He’s exaggerating,” Grantaire grumbled, shutting his sketchbook. “I’m just kind of good at life-drawing...”

Enjolras laughed, and Grantaire’s heart gave a good attempt at seizing.

“Well, I’ve never been able to draw, so maybe I’m not the best judge of talent,” he said, shrugging, “But…I do like your work.”

Grantaire smiled slightly despite himself, and gave a mumbled thanks.

“In any case,” Enjolras continued, checking his watch, “I have to get somewhere...later, Feuilly.”

Enjolras patted Feuilly on the back, and turned to Grantaire, offering his hand.

“Nice to meet you, Grantaire.”

The artist shook his hand, trying not to seem too mystified—and Enjolras left (wiping charcoal on his pants), leaving Feuilly and Grantaire to their artwork.

Grantaire watched him go, eyes glued to his back (and maybe a bit lower).

When he looked back over at Feuilly, he was smirking.

“You’re so far gone.”

“I know,” Grantaire groaned, burying his face in his (charcoal-covered) hands—“It’s horrible. I’m going to start singing about it any second now.”

Feuilly laughed, and started putting his supplies away, shaking his head.

“…he’s gay, you know,” he mentioned off-handedly, and just like that, Grantaire disappeared.

\---

He didn’t actually think he had much of a chance regardless of the campus’ resident Apollo’s sexual preference, but he couldn’t stand to let the small glimmer of hope escape his grasp. A glimmer of hope that sort of sparked and faded away, but in its afterglow Grantaire was already out the door and running—and then, just as quickly, stopping.

He was inches away from actually, physically, running into the guy, since Enjolras had apparently stopped to admire the artwork displayed on the wall.

Grantaire took a few stepped back, and stared at him.

Enjolras stared back at the sudden invasion of his personal space, his eyes flicking downwards for a split second—which made Grantaire suddenly horribly aware of the shirt we was wearing, proclaiming; “I think he’s gay,” with an arrow pointing up to the wearer, and the fact that the V-neck was low enough to reveal a small patch of Grantaire’s manly hairy chest, which, well, he supposed some guys found that attractive, but he really didn’t think anyone would find him attractive with his face bright red under Enjolras’s scrutiny, and covered in charcoal otherwise, and that small glimmer of hope was down to nothing now.

In fact, probably less than nothing, turning into whatever negative hope was (‘despair’, was the word, he would realize later) as he stared into Enjolras’s blue-as-any-cliché eyes.

“Can I,” he started since you can’t just run after a guy and then walk away, “er…”

Can I please have your number?

It was a lot easier thought than said.

Grantaire’s heart pounded against his chest as the encounter got awkwarder by the second.

“…fuck,” he cursed, covering his face and shaking his head. “No, no, I can’t do this, I’m sorry…”

And he left.

\---

Ten minutes after the worst encounter of his life, Grantaire’s phone alerted him to the arrival of a text. It was a screenshot of Feuilly’s ‘Enjolras’ message box, with the most recent text being—“Give him my number.”

The next text was 10 digits.

Grantaire was smiling all the way back to his dorm.


End file.
